Observer News: Bicyclists protest misplaced “rumble strips”
Bicyclists protest misplaced “rumble strips”
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Melody_Jameson on 02/09/2010 17:27:21
By MELODY JAMESON
mj@observernews.net
Photo by Melody Jameson Activists campaign for them. Community planners
designate sites for them. Transportation authorities put them on their “to
do” lists. Governmental agencies encourage their use as means to energy
conservation.
The subject of all this attention is the bikeway, including the single lane set
aside parallel with roadways for bicyclists. In fact, given the attention, one
could get the impression that providing safe lanes on public roads for the
cyclists actually is a priority.
The facts, however, do not bear it out, say area bicyclists. Riding a bicycle
along public roads in South Hillsborough County means encountering road debris,
trash thrown from vehicles, dead animals, fallen trees and objects bounced off
truck beds. The worst obstructions by far, though, are the grooves dug in road
surfaces designed as safety features for motorized vehicles but that act like
long, torturous and often inescapable vibrating steps for the cyclists.
They’re known as “rumble strips.”
And, they are dangerous to bicyclists, says Jim Wheeler, without hesitation.
Wheeler, Kings Point resident and ride leader for the upcoming Sammy’s Ride,
the Arizona to Florida trek to raise funds for pediatric cancer research,
conducts 40, 50, and 60 mile training rides every week on local roads and those
surrounding Hillsborough County. Those rumble strips can upend the most
experienced of cyclists, he asserts.
Plus, “you can’t hear and you can’t see” because of the teeth chattering
vibrations as a light weight racing or long distance bike is driven over the
regularly placed road surface gouges, Wheeler adds. The rumble stripping on the
east and west sides of U.S. 301, south of S.R. 674, for example, is simply
“deadly,” he says.
Another cyclist and Kings Pointer, Ruth Husky, echoes Wheeler’s views. Husky,
who has been riding a bicycle for more than 30 years for exercise and enjoyment,
says she avoids U.S. 301 altogether now. The patterned depressions in the
pavement within the bike lanes is “ very unsafe” and causes riders to
“lose control” of their machines, threatening to toss them into the path of
ongoing traffic, she adds.
The rumble strips “shake the whole bike,” a Fuji road machine, and that
stretch of U.S. 301 from SCC to Ellenton “scares me to death,” Husky says.
Two more SCC riders, Doug Gatchell and his wife, Sharon, favor recumbents, where
the rider is in a more reclined position on the machine, with the feet pedaling
ahead of rather than under the body. Gatchell calls the rumble strips “very
stressful” for all cyclists and especially so for the rider of the recumbent
bike. ”You don’t feel particularly safe,” he notes.
Given that condition and the fact that the recumbent machine is a little wider
than the more conventional two-wheel bike means simply eliminating from the
riding route those roadways known to be unsafe for cyclists because of the
rumble stripping, Gatchell says.
Wheeler points out that he has no objections whatsoever to the rumble strip
concept, adding that, in fact, his father years ago promoted the idea as a law
enforcement officer. And the roadway pavement depressions do alert motor vehicle
drivers when they’re sliding out of their lanes. But he believes the realty
does not match the vision.
Citing a Florida Department of Transportation policy implemented in January,
2009, Wheeler points to the department’s objective to provide audible and
vibratory markings on rural roadways with a posted speed of 50 miles per hour or
greater. The FDOT policy states the markings “shall be installed on the
outside edge lines for all two-lane and multi-lane undivided rural roadways.”
(Emphasis added.)
The markings, however, often are installed in the bike lanes, instead of on the
demarcation line, Wheeler says, and the situation is not confined to
Hillsborough County.
Design engineers in FDOT’s District 7 Tampa office also recognize the problem.
Spokesperson Kris Carson advised The Observer early this week that remedial work
on about 5.5 miles of bikeway along U.S. 301 south of S.R. 674 will be
undertaken as soon as a contractor can be engaged. The rumble strip in the
bikeway will be eliminated and new warnings will be properly placed with new
white striping, she said. It won’t happen right away, but it will happen as
soon as possible, she added
Asked if the issue had been raised in bikeway discussions at the Metropolitan
Planning Organization, an arm of The Planning Commission, Beth Aldren, an MPO
planner, said she was not aware of any such discussion, but added it would be a
topic for consideration by the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee.
Jim Shirk, current committee chairman, told The Observer this week the subject
would be raised during the committee’s monthly meeting on September 8.
Meanwhile, the League of American Bicyclists is stepping up its efforts to
ensure appropriate use of the rumble strip. The strips have their place on
interstate or major highways, but arbitrary use of them on roads not proven to
need them results in “two bad things,” Wheeler notes. “Either the roads
become unusable by cyclists or cyclists are forced to ride in the traffic
lane.” This, he suggests, was not the intent of the federally mandated bicycle
lane vision which so many have strived to make reality.
Copyright 2010 Melody Jameson